Frequency of use and Indications for Beta-Blockers in Heart Failure with Preserved Ejection Fraction

Aim      To evaluate trends in beta-blocker prescribing and incidence of possible reasons for beta-blocker administration, including arterial hypertension (AH), atrial fibrillation (AF), ischemic heart disease (IHD), and myocardial infarction, in participants of clinical studies enrolling patients with chronic heart failure with preserved ejection fraction (CHF-PEF).

Material and methods  A systematic literature search was performed in the PubMed and EMBASE databases. The study included RCSs of pharmacological therapies for patients with CHF-PEF conducted from 1993 through 2019. Studies of beta-blocker efficacy or those including a specific population (CHF-PEF+IHD or CHF-PEF+AH, etc.) were excluded from the analysis. Baseline characteristics of patients, incidence rate of beta-blocker prescribing, and prevalence of AH, AF, IHD, and MI were recorded. Trends in prevalence of concomitant diseases and the proportion of patients using beta-blockers by the year of enrollment to the study were analyzed with the Mann-Kendall test.

Results 14 RCSs of 718 selected publications completely met the inclusion and exclusion criteria. Beta-blocker prescribing significantly increased between 1993 and 2019 (tau=0.51; p=0.014) and reached 80 % in recent studies. Furthermore, prevalence of IHD, MI, AH, and AF did not significantly change among the RCS participants (p>0.05 for all). However, while for AH and AF, a tendency toward an increasing prevalence (tau=0.4; p=0.055 and tau=0.043; p=0.063, respectively) could be considered and became statistically significant for AF when the ALDO-DHF study was excluded from the analysis (tau=0.5; p=0.042), the MI prevalence tended to decrease (tau= –0.73; p=0.06).

Conclusion      Beta-blocker prescribing to patients upon inclusion into RCSs for CHF-PEF has significantly increased for the recent 20 years while the incidence of formal reasons for beta-blocker administration (AF, AH, MI, IHD) did not significantly change.

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